Goodbye Christopher Robin (PG)

As a rule of thumb, if The Guardian's Peter Bradshaw really hates a film, it will have mainstream appeal and be thoroughly enjoyable.

It should, then, come as no surprise that Mr Bradshaw hated Goodbye Christopher Robin.

Of course he did.

It's not an Eastern European four-hour epic about the struggle for bees in an industrialised world starring one man and a tractor and dubbed into Italian.

Instead, it's the story of A. A. Milne and how he came to write the Winnie The Pooh stories.

And it's simply beautiful.

Now, as with IT, I come at this from a personal place - I had these stories read to me as a wee nipper, and then I read them myself when older.

(This may be Bradshaw's issue of course, no one read them to him...)

And they are magical. Full of hope, happiness, imagination, wisdom, and - in the final story - touching poignancy and sadness.

But the story behind the stories is not quite so soft and squishy.

A. A. Milne and his illustrator E. H Shepherd (played perfectly by Domhnall Gleeson and Stephen Campbell Moore respectively) were both suffering from PTSD following action in the First World War.

While struggling to find the words to fight for peace, Milne decamps to the country with his wife and newborn son.

Where inspiration finally strikes.

Through forced circumstances, Milne has to spend time with his son, and so the tales are born.

And this is just one of the hidden gems within this film.

Throughout the midsection, events occur whereby the fan of Pooh can spot events that lead to the stories - and that just gives you a lovely, warm feeling inside.

There is also a scene where Milne and son stare out over a vast landscape, and you can almost feel the tranquillity pouring off the screen.

It's possibly the most relaxing moment we've ever experienced in a cinema.

But don't make the mistake of thinking, as Bradshaw did, that this is a saccharine tale of a childhood legend.

As with the books, there's a darker underbelly lurking.

For a start, the PTSD flashbacks are sudden and shocking - much as Milne would have experienced - and appear with no warning.

They are brilliantly handled and serve to remind us what survivors of The Great War had to live with.

Then there's CR's mother, Daphne.

To say she doesn't come out of this film well would be understatement - and it's a measure of just how good Margot Robbie's portrayal is that you pretty much hate her from the birth onwards.

That's not to say the woman didn't have her good qualities - but it's in seeing these that highlight her selfish core.

In fact it was she that pushed the publicity side of things, robbing her son of a large chuck of his childhood.

I still can't quite believe just how good Robbie was in this role - and I say that as someone who has admired her for a while.

Milne was to blame too, of course, and Gleeson portrays the guilt and inner-conflict well.

But CR was blessed, kind of, to have three parents.

With his nanny Olive (Kelly MacDonald in another fine performance), CR had at least one person who gave him love and attention.

If I'm giving the impression that Goodbye Christopher Robin is somehow a harsh depiction of childhood, forgive me.

It's anything but.

What director Simon Curtis and writers Frank Cottrell Boyce and Simon Vaughan have concocted is a bittersweet, moving, gentle, beautiful tale of how a Bear came to Be and how it affected those around him.

It's warm glow, gentle pacing and note-perfect narrative all combine to create a world you don't want to leave.

And a world that couldn't be without one special boy.

In Will Tilston, the producers have uncovered a very, very talented young man.

You connect with him instantly, and you share his ups and downs as he tries to grow up with the world eventually watching.

It's a performance of maturity way beyond his tender years.

And that, in a way, encapsulates everything that was good about the Pooh books.

They were a simple thing, but worked on several levels and reached an audience far greater than anyone could have imagined.

Certain critics (hi, Peter) may have been sniffy about this film - but when you're swept up from the start and you don't want it to end (and even digital projection issues fail to ruin that feeling), that is surely the mark of a great, great film.

And yes, there were tears at the end...

IT (15)

It's been a funny old week on the nostalgia front - no, not doing that joke - here at Popcorn Towers.

Firstly, a band of my youth (LA Guns, don't judge) have returned with an album that's almost as good as the stuff that made me love them. Another (Gun) have bettered themselves.

And then two literary giants that are the cornerstones of my reading life have hit the big screen.

The other, involving a bear of very little brain, will be chuntered about shortly - because, first, we have to talk about IT.

And I'm not really that keen to.

Partly because the 'no spoiler' house rule is actually going to make my rantings a bit tricky towards the end.

And partly because I really don't want to not like this film.

Now, granted, my memory is perhaps not the strongest some 20 years after I last read this Stephen King masterpiece.

I remember certain things about this book - the bullying, the fear, the grown-ups returning to face those fears.

I don't remember certain other things - in particular, how the kids bond in the sewers.

I think is is because, in the main, the bullying and fear are what I chimed with as a child.

As someone who had a fun two years being the focus of racial abuse and threats of violence, these were themes that really hit home and made the book more personal.

And that's why I really, really wanted to love this film.

I wanted to escape into that psychologically tortuous world once more. I wanted to relive that emotional rollercoaster.

But I was denied that on two fronts.

One, while hinted at and suggested, the fears the children are feeling aren't front and centre.

Instead we get traditional 'big scream' horror tropes and a score that just shouts at you instead of insinuating.

Subtlety has been given the night off here.

Then there's the ending.

Now, you may have seen it already. You may have heard. You may have noticed it on IMDB.

But I hadn't.

And in case you haven't, I'll spare you the details.

Suffice to say that just before the credits rolled, I swore.

And carried on swearing on the way home.

It's just unnecessary.

Anyhoo, can't say no more guv'nor so onwards to the positives.

Because there are some.

For a start, the young stars of the show are all fantastic.

They own this film and convey all the fears and fragility so evident in the book.

And the individual scary moments are handled well, with not too much excessive screaming.

Which can't be said for later scenes, but I digress...

If you ignore the fact this is IT, and park the emotional attachments to the source material, what you have here is a perfectly passable horror flick about a clown.

Bill Skarsgard isn't particularly terrifying as Pennywise, but to be fair he gets upstaged by the CGI, so what's he to do?

But ultimately, IT falls flat. A heavy touch and some infuriating studio decisions robbing us of the film this could have been.

The Limehouse Golem (15)

It's taken me an unnatural amount of time to get round to penning this review - and for once I'm not blaming the busy life of a freelance everythinger.

You see, while enjoyable, it's very hard to actually care about The Limehouse Golem.

It's not a film to get passionate about.

And in many ways, these are the hardest films to review - because it's just so damn hard to give a crap about what you've watched.

If it was 47 Meters Down kinda pish (a film so bad I actually took two goes at getting the title right there) you could rant away to your heart's content.

Or if it was up there with Hidden Figures or The Hitman's Bodyguard, then again - the keys would be walloped with many a fine flourish.

But when you've walked out of cinema thinking nothing more than 'yup, solved that before he did' while wondering what to have for tea...

...well, it's a challenge.

And to be honest, if I wasn't feeling crap at having to miss Suzanne Vega this evening, I would probably still not be getting round to writing this.

For those that missed Golem's briefish run on the big screen, Bill Nighy plays a beleaguered Victorian copper given an unwanted high-profile case on the basis that when he fails to solve it he can be drummed out of town and no one would care.

Sadly, he actually starts putting clues together, and hunting the vicious killer to ground.

The Victorian era is gloriously brought to life, and the whole film has the feel of a classic penny dreadful - gory, sensationalised, but ultimately disposable.

Nighy is very good, as always, but essentially doesn't break out beyond being Bill Nighy, while the rest of the cast glide through being absolutely fine.

But when you have to wait until the final moments of the film for the solitary jump, you can't help but think something was missed somewhere.

Somewhere in here is a chilling, violent, brutal, gory horror thriller that could have you on the edge of your seat.

Instead, you're subjected to something that would struggle to make an impression at 9pm on a Sunday night on BBC1.

Oh well, at least I've written about it now...